County must regroup and bounce back, says Watson

Ross County defender Keith Watson has called for a strong reaction to the Staggies’ 4-0 defeat to Queen of the South which he described as the Dingwall side’s lowest point of the season.

The 10-man Staggies suffered their heaviest defeat of the campaign at Palmerston, having only gone down by the odd goal in each of their three previous league defeats.

Having been beaten by Morton in their previous game, Watson insists the Dingwall men must heed the warning signs from their heavy loss at Dumfries.

Watson said: “It’s really disappointing – I don’t think we were anywhere near good enough.

“I look at myself and I thought I was poor

– it was probably the poorest I have played in a County shirt.

“It needs to be better.

“We’re coming into the business end of the league, it’s two defeats on the trot and we know we need to up our game if we want to stay up there.

“We need to take this as a massive wake-up call. It is probably the lowest the boys have been.

“We were not getting near them and it could have been more – Scott Fox has produced a few great saves as well.

“We know it needs to be so much better than that.”

County remain three points clear at the top of the Championship, due to Ayr United’s 1-0 defeat to Inverness but the Staggies’ focus switches to Scottish Cup action when they travel to Premiership side Motherwell on Saturday.

Watson added: “We don’t feel like there’s pressure.

“We came into the game full of confidence, we had a good week’s training and were really looking forward trying to bounce back after the Morton game.

“It’s a hard one to take but we need to regroup. We’ve got a great group of boys and a great coaching staff, and I’m confident we will bounce back.

“We’ve got a difficult cup tie this weekend so we need to look forward to that and hopefully put on a good show.

“We feel we are capable of beating any team. But it needs to be a lot better.”

Poor: Keith Watson said the match was the worst he had played in a Ross County shirt